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Friday, March 20, 2009

Journey North Mystery Class progress

With the equinox here, we saw some really interesting data for Journey North today. So interesting we decided to spend most of our school day exploring it.

Pictured is our photoperiod graph. As you can see, all the photoperiods from around the world are converging around the 12 hour mark for the equinox.

We were also told that sunrise today in Greenwich, England was 06:03 UT (Universal Time, a.k.a. GMT) then given a table with the sunrise in UT for our 10 mystery classes we are trying to find. It takes the earth 4 minutes to move 1 degree west, so we could calculate our longitude based on this information. I made the calculation for all 10 locations, though the one we're focusing on is E 6.5 degrees (we already figured out from our photoperiod that it was N 4 degrees.) It looks to be in Cameroon, which for our family was quite special since the Pope wrapped up his visit to that country just yesterday.

4 comments:

Hi, Kris. We're really enjoying the JN Mystery Class - it's our first time! Anyway, I must have missed something. How did you figure out the latitude from the photoperiod? We just took some ballpark guesses. Thanks! Dana

One of the things I like about blog carnivals is finding out about other inspiring blogs, like the ones Shannon and Dana have. Thanks, Shannon, for hosting the Charlotte Mason blog carnival and thanks, Dana, for hosting the Hands On Homeschool carnival!

Shannon, I found the Journey North through Dana's blog, LOL! It's put together by Annenberg media and they have a bunch of projects besides the Mystery Class that people can sign up for. The site is learner.org/jnorth

Thanks for the tip about calculating latitude. I had just been on vacation and I guess I didn't catch that. Anyway, we finished calculating the longitudes today and I'm going to try to do the latitudes tomorrow. Thanks!!!

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On Science, Learning, and Faith

"Books dealing with science as with history, say, should be of a literary character, and we should probably be more scientific as a people if we scrapped all the text-books which swell publishers' lists and nearly all the chalk expended so freely on our blackboards."Charlotte MasonA Philosophy of Education

"Some teachers may give a live lesson from a stuffed specimen, and other teachers may stuff their pupils with facts about a live specimen; of the two, the former is preferable."Anna Botsford ComstockHandbook of Nature Study

“Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.”

Pope John Paul II

"Beautiful is what we see.More beautiful is what we understand.Most beautiful is what we do not comprehend."Bl. Nicolas StenoFounder of modern geology

"Go my Sons, burn your books and buy stout shoes, climb the mountains, search the valleys, the deserts, the sea shores, and the deep recesses of the earth...Observe and experiment without ceasing, for in this way and no other will you arrive at a knowledge of the true nature of things." Petrus Severinus16th century Danish alchemist

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"Furthermore, and contrary to popular belief, the Church never supported the idea that the earth is flat, never banned human dissection, never banned the zero, and certainly never burnt anyone at the stake for scientific ideas."James HannamThe Genesis of Science